


Watchmen Drabbles

by tortoisegirl



Category: Watchmen - All Media Types
Genre: F/M, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2012-05-06
Updated: 2012-05-06
Packaged: 2017-11-04 23:02:22
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 12
Words: 1,528
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/399168
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tortoisegirl/pseuds/tortoisegirl
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A collection of (mostly) 100-word drabbles for a prompt table. Each chapter title will list the prompt, characters or pairings, and warnings.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. White - Nite Owl & Rorschach

Nite Owl first discloses his name on the night Rorschach shows up with a flower on his suit jacket.

Tucked into a buttonhole, the white bloom picks up the pale lines of the suit, amplifying them, solidifying the lean human form in sharp pinstripes. It strikes Dan then that Rorschach is a person— not an idea wrapped in a costume, but a man, a man who wears a suit and a mask and a flower in a buttonhole. It's not a thought that's hit him with such clarity before.

“Uh,” Dan says. “I like the flower.” 

Just the barest grunt of a response as Rorschach brushes past him and climbs into the Owlship. 

Later that night the ship hovers in the clouds, Nite Owl at the steering column and Rorschach beside him talking through a case. The flower is still peeking out from the buttonhole. Dan finds himself constantly drawn back to the thing, small and pale and mystifying. Rorschach’s never done something like wear a flower on his jacket before.

There’s a pause in Rorschach's talking.

“You can call me Dan,” Nite Owl says then. “That’s my name. Daniel Dreiberg.”

Rorschach looks at him sidelong, nods, turns back to the window. The ship drift away from the cloud cover.

Dan ducks his head. “I really like the flower.”

“Thank you,” Rorschach says.


	2. Kisses, Nite Owl/Rorschach

They have kissed before, in a heated, frantic way that Rorschach now accepts. Kissing Nite Owl is always a storm of pent-up energies, all wound together with adrenaline, violence, frustration. Always in shadowy places. Always coming away bitten and scratched. These are things he understands.

It’s the kiss that Nite Owl gives him under the lights of the Owlship, a quick and unheralded press of lips against his mask, that he doesn’t understand.

“What was that for?”

He shrugs. “I just wanted to. I like kissing you, or haven’t you noticed?”

It's this that leaves Rorschach feeling hollowed out, shaking.


	3. Pink - Silk Spectre & Rorschach

“You’re sure this is the place?”

“Ehh.” Rorschach checks his notes, looks back up at the house. “It’s where the information points.” He sounds just a touch uncertain. If he were to ever sound uncertain in front of her, that is.

They’re looking at a townhouse supposedly housing a massive stock of narcotics. The bricks are coated in pink paint the shade of children’s cough medicine, edged entirely in scalloped white trim. Lace curtains peek out from the windows.

“Perhaps décor is meant to throw off suspicion.”

Laurie looks at him sidelong, smirking. “Barbie dreamhouse drug headquarters. Who’d have guessed?”


	4. Jealousy, Nite Owl/Rorschach

“Three would be too many, and Adrian and I are the most familiar with operations like this.”

“We’re partners. Worked together for years. We can handle this better, Daniel. Without him. Ridiculous to think he can come in and partner with you out of nowhere and have it work. Barely know anything about him.”

“It’s just one time…”

“So he claims. Don’t trust him.”

“Christ, you sound so jealous right now.”

Rorschach flinches back at that. He stiffens, balls his hands into fists and shakes, but for the first time that night Rorschach has no answer.

Daniel’s eyes widen. “Oh!”


	5. Future - Jon/Laurie

"I'm not a crystal ball, Laurie."

"You sure glow like one."

Jon smiles at that. "I can only see my own future."

"But if I'm in your future you can see me, right? In the events that involve both of us."

He can see her; see her twining her timeline with his as she grows out of her teens, into her twenty and thirties. He smiles, because as he witnesses their future spread out before him he knows he will enjoy it as it spools out, day by day, his long years with her.

"So," Laurie teases. "What's my future?"


	6. Blue - Dollar Bill/Mothman

Blue, the PR guys say. Dollar Bill's costume is going to be predominately blue. Green would be too obvious, too greedy and corporate when you put it with the name, but blue. A strong color, an American color, bringing it all back to good old American capitalism and your friendly neighborhood bank. Brings out the kid's eyes too, they say, and between that and his smile they'll have the ladies lining up to open accounts.

A few months later a man dressed as a moth shyly agrees about his eyes, and Bill decides that yeah, blue was a good choice.


	7. Rain - Jon/Laurie

Laurie's used to trawling the city in her slip of a costume; comfortable in heels, prepared with an alternate for cold. But the short, sheer ensemble is not built for rain. Laurie swears and pulls her arms in close as she rants against the costume, her mother's fashion sense, unpredictable summer storms.

"Would you...?" she asks over the rain patter.

Jon lifts a hand and conjures a shield that hugs her form. Watches her brush beaded drops from her skirt and unstick hair from her forehead, water bouncing and rolling around her.

"Thanks," she says, blinking rain from her lashes.


	8. Thunder - Hollis & Phantom

Nite Owl stoops to peer at the cowering dog doing his best to wedge himself under the car. Overhead, the long, low roll of thunder subsides.

"C'mon, boy. You've faced down some of the worst things this city could throw at you. Don't tell me you're scared of a little thunder."

Phantom looks up with big, frightened eyes.

"What would all the crooks say if they saw you now, huh?"

The air suddenly crackles with a bone-shaking blast of thunder. Phantom whimpers. Hollis jumps near out of his skin.

"Alright, you win. Probably best to hunker down at home tonight."


	9. Thanksgiving - Nite Owl & Rorschach

"There's enough left over for another full meal. Can I tempt you?"

The offer is sincere, nothing but good faith - which shouldn't surprise Rorschach, considering, but he's a little taken aback by it; they haven't spent any significant time together outside of the streets. He knows the distant professionalism they began with is sliding into...something else. Something he's not used to, that prickles like new skin, but holds the promise of something brilliant.

And really, if there's anything he's been grateful for lately...

"A little late but...a Nite Owl-Rorschach team Thanksgiving," Nite Owl says. "What do you say?"


	10. Orange - Laurie/Rorschach

"It is not. And," Laurie quips, "I think you should take that back."

Walter snarls, "Don't be stupid. And don't patronize me," and turns his back. 

She moves too fast: the wind is knocked out of him and he's suddenly face to face with the floor. Laurie presses all her weight on his lower back; one hand twists his arm around, immobilizing. The other hand she combs through the messy, burnt orange hair he just called "the most ridiculous hair color to be stuck with." 

She leans forward until she can breathe into his ear. "I said, take it back."


	11. Anniversary - Dan/Rorschach

"It's been six years since we started working together," Rorschach says. "Today."

“Really?” Daniel calls from inside Archie's hull, up to his shoulders in circuitry. From where he’s sitting on the steps leading into the ship Rorschach has a good view of him, t-shirt riding up his back a little as he works. "You remember the day?"

"You don't?"

A laugh, and Daniel withdraws from his tinkering.

"Recorded it, of course,” Rorschach explains. “Not everyday you save a man dressed as an owl from a gang of thirteen year olds."

He remembers writing about their unexpected, fledgling arrangement that night, back in his youthful days when he was simultaneously fearless and unsure about everything he did. _Partnership may prove to be a beneficial_ , he’d written, so long ago. It's almost funny what a staggering understatement that proved to be.

"Hey, those kids were fifteen at least. And I could have handled them." Dan tosses aside his tools and slides into the space next to Rorschach. Rorschach would have objected, once, to the way their knees bumps as Dan sits close. "You'd been tailing me for about a week at that point, though. I think you just wanted an excuse to talk to me."

It’s a sly look that Dan’s giving him. He nudges Rorschach with an elbow. "Do you remember the dates of any other anniversaries?"

Rorschach frowns. He doesn't; he never wrote down any of the facts of _those_ encounters. There are many vivid, tactile memories of their more intimate firsts, but no dates, so instead he grumbles and accuses Dan of having a one track mind.

“I would have planned something if I’d remembered. It’s been a good six years.”

Rorschach nods. There are still plenty of things he’s unsure about – present relationship with Daniel included - but this he knows. “Yes. It has.”


	12. Sunrise - Hollis & Sally

"You do this often?" Hollis asks. "Never took you for a sunrise kinda gal."

"It's not the first time I've seen a sunrise after being out all night with a boy, I'll say that much," Sally answers, flirty. 

There's not much of a horizon from where they are, but they can watch the pale light steadily expand behind the blocky skyline.

"No one else gets to see it like this," she breathes. Then, after a beat: "You know, dead tired and about to keel over on a rooftop.

Hollis nods, as the light brightens her face, glints on her hair.


End file.
